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IHE International Gains Official ISO Liaison Status
Deployment of standards-based electronic health record systems benefits from strong global alignment of Standards Development Organizations, and are supported by national and regional collaboratives.
CHICAGO – (December 15, 2011) – Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE) International announced today that the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has granted IHE “Category A” Liaison status with the ISO Health Informatics Technical Committee (ISO/TC215), effective October 19th, 2011. This status allows IHE to participate in the collaborative development and publishing of Standards through ISO, and IHE joins other distinguished international standards development organizations (SDO’s) such as HL7, IHTSDO, CEN, CDISC and ISO in this global initiative.
ISO TC215 is committed to “standardization in the field of information for health and Health Information and Communications Technology (ICT) to achieve compatibility and interoperability between independent systems, as well as to ensure compatibility of data for comparative statistical purposes (e.g. classifications) and to reduce duplication of effort and redundancies.” Liaison “A” partners facilitate an unprecedented level of cooperation and collaboration in order to meet these objectives on a global scale.
IHE International is well-known for the development and maintenance of IHE “profiles”, which provide precise implementation specifications, based on established international standards, to address specific health IT interoperability needs. The profiles provide guidance that details required actions for health IT systems with many different functions to acquire, manage and communicate vital medical information effectively, while supporting efficient provider workflows and protecting private health information.
This formalized international collaboration between IHE and the other prominent SDO’s strengthens the foundation of standards that are adopted domestically. Many countries around the world, including Canada and the European nations, have developed national and regional relationships amongst the “deployment” arms of these SDO’s, which produces country-specific localizations of the international standards.
IHE profiles have provided the foundation for numerous health information exchange networks in the US and worldwide. Numerous profiles were selected as components of the US federal electronic health record standards published by the Healthcare Information Technology Standards Panel (HITSP), and many of the HITSP specifications have been adopted by the Standards & Interoperability Framework initiatives published by the US Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT under its campaign to promote meaningful use of EHRs. Additionally, IHE profiles form the core technical construct for information exchanges in Europe’s EPSOS Project, as well as in many other EHR projects across the globe.
IHE Technical Frameworks, the documents in which IHE profiles are published, are annually expanded and continuously maintained by committees of volunteers in the 13 active IHE domains. Each domain is sponsored and overseen by organizations representing healthcare providers and health IT stakeholders from within that domain.
“Having the Category A Liaison status is truly an indication of IHE’s commitment towards the standardization of quality health and medical information, allowing it to be gathered and shared in a clinically-relevant manner,” stated Michael Nusbaum, IHE Board member and newly-appointed Liaison Officer to ISO TC215. “This new relationship will enable IHE to work hand-in-hand with ISO and the other international SDO’s, allowing us to significantly strengthen and escalate our contributions to date.”
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About IHE International
IHE International, Inc. (www.ihe.net) is the global hub of the IHE initiative, a multi-stakeholder effort started in 1997 to promote the effective use of electronic health records and health information technology (HIT) by driving the adoption of standards-based solutions for interoperability. IHE International brings together HIT experts and stakeholders in more than a dozen clinical and operational domains to develop implementation guides call IHE Profiles that define the use of standards to address specific HIT interoperability needs. It also oversees a process of testing that fosters the adoption of IHE Profiles in real-world HIT products and care settings. IHE interoperability solutions are implemented in hundreds of products and in care sites around the world.
About IHE USA
IHE USA (www.iheusa.org) is a not-for-profit organization established in 2010 that operates as a deployment committee of IHE International®. The mission of IHE USA is to drive adoption of standards-based interoperability to improve patient care through innovation, standards profiling, testing, education and collaboration. IHE USA improves the efficiency and effectiveness of healthcare delivery by supporting the deployment of standards-based electronic health record systems, facilitating the exchange of health information among care providers, both within the enterprise and across care settings, and enabling local, regional and nationwide health information networks in the United States, all in a manner consistent with participation in the activities of IHE International inc.
About ISO
ISO (International Organization for Standardization) is the world's largest developer and publisher of International Standards. ISO began operations on 23 February 1947.
ISO is a network of the national standards institutes of some 162 countries, with a Central Secretariat in Geneva, Switzerland, that coordinates the system. More than 100 of ISO's members are from developing countries.
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